Upcoming Deadlines - the final countdow

Here's a reminder of the deadlines. Make sure these are uploaded by the day and time stated:

• YOUR FILM SHOULD BE FULLY EDITED BY NOW, BUT ANY REMAINING 'TWEAKING' IS A PRIORITY AND MUST BE COMPLETED URGENTLY
• AUDIENCE FEEDBACK: THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN ONGOING FROM PLANNING STAGES THROUGH TO ROUGH CUTS/DRAFTING STAGES AND COMPLETION (SEE BOOKLETS). IF YOU HAVE ANY OF THIS LEFT TO DO, IT'S URGENT AS YOU ARE ASSESSED ON THIS.
• POSTER: ALL PREVIOUS DEADLINE WORK IS NOW VERY URGENT (EG TAKING THE 2 FINAL DESIGNS TO A MORE ADVANCED DRAFTING STAGE USING YOUR HIGH RESOLUTION IMAGES FOR EG - DUE LAST FRIDAY! EVIDENCE OF DRAFTING WITH THOROUGH EXPLANATIONS IN MULTI MEDIA FORMAT IS ESSENTIAL FOR MARKING.
• POSTER: YOUR NEXT FORMAL DEADLINE IS THE FINAL DEADLINE - 18TH DECEMBER.
• REVIEW: ALL PREVIOUS DEADLINE WORK IS NOW VERY URGENT - EG INDIVIDUAL  EVIDENCE OF RESEARCH INTO LWLs MAGAZINE AUDIENCE, LAYOUT AND REASONS FOR CHOICE (ALL EXPLAINED IN ANDREW'S LESSON AND ON OUR BLOGS OR BOOKLET)
• REVIEW: FOLLOWING THE LANGUAGE LESSON (WITH Marion), YOU HAVE AN INDIVIDUAL RESEARCH TASK TO SCAN OR COPY FROM GOOGLE IMAGES AND SAVE AS A JPEG, ONE REVIEW PAGE EACH AND ANNOTATE THE REVIEW IN WORD FOR STRUCTURE AND LANGUAGE TECHNIQUES (USE THE PLAN I GAVE YOU AND THE EXERCISE WE DID ON 'ZERO DARK THIRTY' AND 'JACK REACHER' IN THE LESSON)
• REVIEW: COPY DRAFT ON BLOG AND AS WORD DOC TO YOUR SUPERVISOR BY END OF MONDAY (9TH) -ONE PER GROUP
• REVIEW: LAYOUT DRAFT FRAME WITH IMAGE TO BLOG BY END OF MONDAY - ONE PER GROUP
• MISSING OR INADEQUATE BLOG POSTS MUST BE FILLED IN - HOMEWORK SHOULD BE 3 HOURS PER WEEK!
• FINAL REVIEW, POSTER AND PORTFOLIO DEADLINE (NOT EVALUATION) - WED 18TH DEC.

Ancillary task two 

Writing the Film Review.

Work to post on your blog and upcoming deadlines

Post One - Rationale for writing a film review for LWL magazine

Post Two - What is this magazine about and who reads it (use Moodle for this content)

Post Three - What are the layout conventions of a Film Review in this magazine.  This should also incorporate technical details like page width and height, measurements of columns and margins and the image and also the main fonts used. (Use the K drive for this)

Feedback on Initial Poster deadline

Well done those of you that have met this deadline.

The following have missed this deadline and something needs to be posted very soon.

Daisy and Georgia
Charlotte H
Jake and Sam
Charles
Max H
Ziaul. Elliot and Keelen
Helen, Callum and Helena.

Some of you have completely missed the both poster deadlines - not god for planning marks when allocated.

If these posts are not entered at all, then it has even more serious consequences for your grade.

Feedback on initial Poster research submission.


Well done to those of you that have completed the task and completed your allocation.

I have yet to see Anything from the following students - Callum N, and George J and Georgia H M

Jodie C, Elliot, Ziaul and Tom H have very little - this would mean only gaining level one.

Some others have done good work but not completed your allocation - Max A, Charles T, Max H, Helena W, Do so and you should secure a good grade.

Rememeber this all feeds into your overall Research and planning grade.

Deadline two -  Friday November 22nd

Each group member will need to upload an intial draft of their individual idea for a poster.

Use Photoshop to do this - we dont simply want some poorly drawn imagery

Use the checklist below to remind yourself of what could be included on your poster
Note that an age certification and urecognition of actors is not necessary for a short film poster.

The Film Poster - Initial Research into 3 / 4 Film Posters.  Deadline 18th November.

 
You have been given the brief and guidelines for the first of two ancillary tasks.

What do you have to do?

1. Research upto 12 posters as a group (British, independent , low budget)
2. Here you will document conventions and discuss layout and graphics.
3 In addition, discuss each poster applying the 5 main concepts

4. Start designing your brand logo.

Documenting your Editing process

Again, some evidence of yourselves at the i-mac.

• Really good practice will be to discuss the decisions that you take whilst editing - provide some examples of the choices you have made.  
• Having several versions of a particular scene and your reasons for choosing the one that you use is good practice.
• Even better is the above, but also asking your target audience to comment on it, and take your decision from their responses.

Documenting your filming process

Provide evidence of your filming having taken place - these can be still or moving image evidence.

Post discussions reflecting on the strengths and weaknesses of your filming - in particular reflect on the weaknesses and how you could/will improve!

YOU MUST CHECK WITH US THAT YOU ARE PERMITTED GO ON TO FILMING.YOU ARE OVER HALF WAY THROUGH THE FILMING STAGE!

The EXTENDED deadline for improving your individual RESEARCH grade ENDS TONIGHT. AFtTER TONIGHT, ANY IMPROVEMENTS MAY NOT BE MARKED. At this stage, there appear to be many people who have not acted on our advice or in any way improved their work. This is a serious situation, and very likely to affect your individual grade. However, you are reminded that you must also let us know if you have improved your work - don't expect us to re-read all of your work on the chance that you might have done something to it! So far, only one person has contacted me to say this.
In the meantime, ANY MISSED PLANNING TASKS ARE ALSO NOW VERY LATE AND AFTER THE DEADLINE FOR THIS WORK. You will already have lost marks for late work, as this is recorded on our Tracking Grids, but there are still several groups who have not completed all of the tasks listed on the checklist (mentioned many times by myself and Andrew). Your blogs should have a heading for each of the tasks on the list, and these should now have plenty of detailed information about planning, using terms, theory, detail, analysis and varied visual material. This should have been shared within the group, with your names appearing in headings and archive. Any changes to planning must also be blogged. YOU MUST STILL ASK FOR PERMISSION TO START FILMING, AND CLEARLY YOUR FILMING TIME IS NOW SQUEEZED BY YOUR LATE WORK.
AS YOU KNOW, WE ARE NOW COMING TO THE END OF THE FILMING PHASE, AND THE DEADLINE FOR THIS IS THE END OF THIS WEEK. Any filming to take place after this time MUST be agreed by us as this must be a permitted extension. Do not assume that cameras will be available at Half Term as there are not enough for all groups to do this.
AS WE APPROACH HALF TERM, WE EXPECT VERY HARD WORK FROM ALL GROUPS THIS WEEK, INCLUDING EVIDENCE OF WORK AS HOMEWORK AT HOME AND IN STUDY PERIODS.

Tuesday, 15 October 2013

YOU MUST CHECK WITH US THAT YOU ARE PERMITTED GO ON TO FILMING.YOU ARE OVER HALF WAY THROUGH THE FILMING STAGE!

Although we are now half way through the FILMING TIME ALLOWED, you are not permitted to begin filming until we have given you the go-ahead based on how well you have completed the planning as a group. DON'T FORGET TO CHECK THE LIST OF TASKS POSTED BELOW (ALSO IN YOUR BOOKLET), AND AS A GROUP, MAKE SURE YOU HAVE BLOGGED YOUR RESPONSES TO THE APPLICATION OF THE 5 KEY CONCEPTS TO YOUR FILM. IF YOU GO AHEAD WITHOUT CHECKING THIS, YOU RISK COMING UNSTUCK IN THE EXAM (SECTION 1B)! The longer you continue to plan, the more delay you are creating! Deadlines are fixed, and so this will squeeze time later for editing, and so on. REMEMBER, THIS IS YOUR INDEPENDENT STUDY/HOMEWORK TOO, AND REMAINING TASKS SHOULD BE COMPLETED IMMEDIATELY. NO-ONE SHOULD STILL BE PLANNING AFTER THE END OF THIS WEEK.

References for UCAS

As part of the reference that we will be writing on you for your university applications, we would like to include information about your short film.  In particular your ability to visualisie and plan a short film will be of great interest to admissions offficers.  It is therefore in your interest to really ensure that you have completed all the planning stages very soon because we are in the process now of writing these.

NEXT DEADLINE - FILMING - ROUGH CUT: FRIDAY 25TH OCT

ONLY WHEN YOU'VE POSTED THE MATERIAL NEEDED TO PASS THE PLANNING STAGE (see last post) WILL YOU BE ABLE TO START FILMING. YOU ARE NOW OFFICIALLY IN THE FILMING STAGE, SO TREAT ANY REMAINING PLANNING TASKS AS URGENT! SOME PEOPLE HAVE STILL NOT COMPLETED RESEARCH. AFTER THE END OF THIS WEEKEND, NO FURTHER RESEARCH WILL BE MARKED.

Deadline Two - continued

IT'S ESSENTIAL THAT THIS STAGE IS DONE PROPERLY BEFORE YOU START FILMING.
DON'T FORGET TO USE THE CHECKLIST BELOW (IN YOUR BOOKLET):

Pre-Production Checklist – tick off tasks as you complete them

Allocate pre-production roles in the group: location scout; prop ‘buyer’; storyboard artist/s; animatics director; sound designer; lighting designer; screenwriter; camera operator/s; costume, hair and make-up designer and ‘buyer’; posting synopsis and shot list to blog.	Done
Group writes synopsis – about 200 words posted to blog
5 Key Concepts: Genre and style decisions – single genre? Hybrid? Or resist genre category? Will you use established film styles – eg Social Realism or ‘Noir’? Decisions to blog with justification and links to similar real texts if possible (these may be feature length films)
5 Key Concepts: representation – initial ideas about representation of social groups, places and ideas or issues covered by your story, posted to blog
5 Key Concepts: audience – initial ideas about your expected audience – by age, gender and social class. Link to expected viewing platforms for your film (where would it be screened ideally?). Post to blog.
5 Key Concepts: narrative – initial ideas about the structure of the story – linear? Non-linear? Circular? Use narrative theory here – Todorov; Levi-Strauss; Vogler..Post to blog.
5 Key Concepts: media language – initial ideas about film techniques you’d like to use and examples or suggestions posted to blog
Location decisions and photos of selected and rejected locations
Written permission granted for privately owned locations
Storyboard for all shots, carefully timed to ensure that film lasts 5 mins
Animatic with voice-over commentary
Acting decisions

Deadline Two approaching - Pre Production planning


You will need to be getting on with the storyboard on post-it notes early this week, and by the end of the week, you should have completed 2 ANIMATICS:  

One should have each shot timed correctly, so that the total animatic lasts as near to 5 mins as possible (not more than 10% either way), 

The second should have a detailed and previously scripted commentary to explain the techniques used in detail, and explain what else the shot would do (your post-it note is only 1 FRAME of the total shot - it's a single frame in the editing process). See our additional handout information on this (also on moodle)

Completing your research

You have now started planning.

Alot of you still need to complete or start the 3 outstanding posts -

• weaknesses from last year,
• glossary of terms,
• research into 10 shorts.

Blogger


is a chronological package and you can't go back and insert poosts into the correct place.  I would suggest therefore that you insert the titles of any missing POSTS which will allow you to return to them, complete them and maintain the overall order of the blog.

Short film links

 

 

 

 

 

You could try this search as well - click here

Post Four

Research into Short films.

Deadline for this is Friday September 20th. (block 5 have until Monday 23rd)

Read the guidance on Moodle (also some printed copies in GF5).

Conduct  Textual Analysis on 10 Short Films in total.

3 of these can be of films that you analysed during the transition period.
The other 7 need to be original Short films that we did not study in class.

This is a total of 10 per group member

The whole point of this exercise is to apply all 5 media concepts - Genre, Representation, Audience, Narrative and Media Language, to each film.  Lok at the guidance notes for help with this.  See MOODLE for guidance

We appreciate that this is a considerable piece of work - it si quite acceptable to concentrate on some concepts more than others in in some films.  e.g. a short film about Old Age or Disability will lend itself particularly well to a discussion on REPRESENTATION.

Try to research films with a similar time frame (5 mins) - this will help you in assessing what is realistic to achieve in 5 mins.

Be imaginative in how you post this - it does not have to be written - you could present it as a video commentary for instance.  If you do opt for a written style, we expect lots of Screen grabs or Excerpts from the films that you analyse.

PLUS, For each short film that you analyse, discuss how you would like to take any of the ideas forward into your own work.  

Show the connection between films that you have watched and your own work

Post Three

List the 5 main concepts and the key theorists and terms associated with each.  This post will simply serve as a reminder for when you are writing later posts and it will also help you when it comes to question 1b of the exam.  Use Moodle (A2 Media) to locate the notes from the transition period)

Narrative

Genre

Audience

Representation

and don't forget MEDIA LANGUAGE!!!!!!!!!

This can be a group post

Post Two

What problems did you have in the making of your foundation portfoilio?

What lessons have you learnt and how are you going to overcome these this time round?

If you are working in the same group, this can be a single post, however, if you are now in a group made up of several previous groups, you need to do this for each of the previous groups.

What ever the format, each individual should identify personal targets identifying what they will personally improve upon this during the advanced portfolio.

 

 



Post one

Your group photo with an introduction.

Welcome back and welcome to your second year.

You will be starting work on your Advanced Portfolio immediately - researching and Planning for the short film.

Media studies achieved its best ever results last year - 62% of students got an A*, A or B grade.  There is no reason why you should not be aiming for something similar - certainly your AS grades make it a realistic possibility.

Choose your group carefully - are the people you work with reliable, can you meet up easily both inside and outside of college, do they offer different skill sets?

You need to tell us who you will be working with VERY SOON!

Special Announcement for A2 Media Students:

Due to earlier timetabling of the Advanced Portfolio work this year,

we have decided we can offer the following to ALL STUDENTS to maximise

achievement:

· the chance to make improvements to ANY part of the portfolio

· between today and MARCH 20th

· BUT THE FOLLOWING MUST BE

UNDERSTOOD.....

 

· March 20th is the absolute FINAL DEADLINE (exam board deadline follows immediately after internal marking)

· you may not be allowed to begin work that you

didn't do in the first place!

· Previous deadlines will still count as part of your

process and time management (marks will still be

deducted if you missed the March 4th deadline)

· Normal levels of supervision will not apply (we are

preparing and teaching you the exam unit)

· You will be expected to manage your own work

· You will need to alert us on the blog and by email to

any changes made to products or blog

· Work on the production must NEVER be used as a

reason for not completing ANY other work or missing

lessons in Media or other subjects.

· You may use our comments to improve your work

· Any changes made to the products MUST BE CLEAR ON THE BLOG FINAL PRODUCTS MUST BE LABELLED AS SUCH

· IF YOU CHANGE YOUR FILM AT ALL, YOU MUST UPDATE THE FILM IN THE 'FINISHED' FOLDER ON THE MAC NETWORK.

Special Announcement for A2 Media Students:

Due to earlier timetabling of the Advanced

Portfolio work this year,

we have decided we can offer the following

to ALL STUDENTS to maximise

achievement:

the chance to make improvements to ANY

art of the portfolio

between today and MARCH 20th

 

 

BUT THE FOLLOWING MUST BE

UNDERSTOOD.....